Morality

From Dad:

I find the humanist manifesto rather terrifying because it insists there is no design, no purpose, no meaning, no morality. We are just a collection of molecules that arrived by chance and we are slaves to our DNA, having no free will. I just don't have enough faith to believe that my existence and yours and that of the entire universe is one of pure chance.

You say that you find the "humanist manifesto" rather terrifying because it insists there is no design, no purpose, no meaning, no morality, and no free will. I'm not really sure what this "humanist manifesto" is, but how does a lack of design and purpose also lead to a lack of morality and free will? I just don't see the connection there. While the whole topic of morality and free will is probably best addressed in a future conversation, I do still believe I have a sense of morality, and I believe my morals are better than those of a bible that condones slavery and stoning unruly children to death.

There are many around us in our culture who prefer having no accountability to a higher truth, thereby giving them "permission" to define right and wrong for themselves. This was the original lie proposed to man in the Garden: you can be like God...you get to define what is good and evil...you have no need of God to tell you.

It's seems silly to think that anyone would not believe in God because they don't want someone to tell them right and wrong. Wouldn't you still have to believe in God for that to be true? I know many people think that atheists and skeptics are what they are because they want to be able to go out and party and do drugs and rape and pillage small villages. Honestly, If I followed God's word as a moral compass, then raping and pillaging should be morally acceptable.

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Evidence for No-God

From Dad:

At some point, you take the evidence you have for God and compare it to the evidence you have for no-God and develop your own belief about the matter. Proof when it comes even to proving what our mind is constructed from is perhaps not scientifically possible. In the same way, something that exists outside our universe is not subject to scientific study.

There's a flaw in the statement that "you take the evidence for God and the evidence for No-God and develop your own belief about the matter." The quest for knowledge of the truth (otherwise known as "science") does not work that way. We don't take a claim and then look at the evidence for the "non-claim". All you have is a claim, and either you can back up that claim with evidence or you can't. It's called the "burden of proof". In any logical argument, the party making the claim has the burden of proof. If I tell you that there's an invisible purple dragon in my back yard, and that I have no direct evidence to back it up, would you believe me? What if I asked you to prove me wrong? Would you be able to? Would that mean I'm right?

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Absolute Truth

From Dad:

Is there such a thing as absolute truth? Is there truth that is NOT absolute?

I most certainly believe that there is absolute truth. Anyone who claims that there is no absolute truth will be contradicting themselves, because the claim itself is absolute. What's really at stake here is our knowlege of that absolute truth. Can we ever "know" absolute truth? I don't believe we can. As discussed in my epistemological definitions, I believe that knowlege of the truth is on a scale of certainty, and we can never be absolutely (as in 100%) certain of anything -- this is the foundation of philisophical skepticism.

Does all truth come from science? Philosophy?

Due to my definitions of truth and knowlege, the answer is no. Truth is truth, regardless of what we know about it. We can't change the truth. Science, however, is the best tool we have for gaining whatever knowlege we can of that truth.

What is "Belief" and how do we as humans arrive at one or the other? By evidence or by prejudice?

Again, I'll refer you to my epistemological definition of belief. Belief simply comes from our degree of certainty of the truth. How we arrive at a conclusion or a belief is all subjective. Some people arrive at a belief by evidence, others by prejudice. Because I want to know as many true things as possible and as few false things as possible, I try my best to avoid any prejudice when defining my beliefs. I try my best make a decision based on the evidence at hand. That's not to say I'm not biased towards certain ideas. I think everyone is. The challenge for us is to overcome our biases, no matter what they are, in search for that absolute truth.

Is it even possible for science to address the problem of "the Beginning" or "the First Cause". Is this left to faith or does the existence of God require only "enough evidence to convict"?

Currently, science has not explained what happened before the big bang, or what caused it. Is it possible that science ever can explain it? I don't think it's likely, but as I said before, nothing is for certain. Is this then, left to faith? Why need it be left to anything? Why can't we just say "we don't know?" As I said earlier, until there's more evidence, any explanation is pure speculation. The same goes for how "life sprang from non-life." I don't believe science has yet answered the question of abiogenesis. Although in this case, there are many good theories that try to explain abiogenesis. While they are all currently speculative, I actually believe that science is very close to solving that problem. In fact, I'd be willing to bet we'll have some evidence that points to a solution within my lifetime (I'm just speculating, though).

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What's the point?

From Dad:

Who wrote the laws by which the universe was born and continues to operate? It's one thing to consider that a particle or a universe popped into existence by chance. It's another thing to consider how the precise laws by which all the particles relate to each other in a fashion to allow life were written is far more complex and points logically to a pre-existing "divine" and uncaused super-mind.

Since I've already covered arguments from design, I wanted to address the usage of the phrase "by chance". It seems to me that you believe "by chance" means "without cause". Thinking of it this way is a false dichotomy. That is, you're saying that either it happened by chance or it was caused by something. Consider this: If I roll a set of dice, have I not caused the dice to tumble onto the table, even though the final configuration of those dice (for the sake of example) is completely by chance? Yes, I'm willing to bet that the big bang had a cause, but I'm not going to claim to know what that cause is until there's hard scientific evidence (which we may never have).

Is the prime shaping force of the universe chance or design? If all is by chance, are there reasons for existence, even survival? If there is design, is there a designer (A supernatural mind...First Mind)? If there is design, does that imply purpose beyond survival?

I think that brings up one of the questions that people have asked themselves since the dawn of intelligence -- "If there's no reason for my existence, why should I exist at all?" I think we all have this deep desire to believe that we are part of something bigger, and that our sense of "self" is not just one of a billion people on a tiny planet orbiting one of a hundred billion of stars which are all inside one of a hundred billion galaxies in the universe. It's a tough thing to come to grips with. Let's assume, for example, that there is no meaning behind our existence -- that who we are did occur by chance and that we were not designed. Does this mean I should just put a gun to my head and end it all? That's ridiculous! Life would not exist on this planet in the first place if there wasn't an inherent need for survival. I have a deep-seated mechanism within me that keeps me from pulling the trigger. It would take an immense force of will or psychological disorder to overcome that. Personally, I feel that "not existing" is not an alternative. If I'm lucky enough to exist at all, why should I want to put forth all the effort to end that? I don't need to have a divine purpose in order to want to survive.

Probably the five most consequential questions you and I will face in our life are:

1. Origin: Where did we come from?
2. Identity: Who are we?
3. Meaning: Why are we here?
4. Morality: How should we live?
5. Destiny: Where are we going?

While that is completely subjective, I think I can mostly agree with that. I try to ask myself these questions in one way or another every day, and I'll admit that they're much more difficult to answer without religion answering them for me. I think there's something to be said, though, for being able to reason through these questions on our own, instead of having someone else do it for us.

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First Cause

Even though I've covered this topic previously, my dad brought up a series of questions:

Was there a cause or no cause to creation? Is something out of nothing a logical possibility? If so, all the laws of chemistry and physics would be invalid.

• Law of causality: all effects have a cause. These effects cannot be self caused
• The First Cause would have to exist outside of the universe and have no cause, therefore would have to be eternal in nature
• Multiple universe theories have no solution to the problem. There's no way to test the theory and they still have to have a first cause -- it only multiplies the problem rather than give meaningful answers
• Therefore, only two possibilities exist:
  1. The universe is eternal and without cause. (Everything came from nothing...somehow, or has existed forever...somehow)
  2. There is a First Cause that is eternal outside the universe (Everything came from something outside the universe who is eternal and without cause)
• Which is more logical to believe? Which has more evidence?

There is a similar argument in Islamic philosophy called the Kalam Cosmological Argument (a modernized version of the cosmological argument) which states a premise that everything that begins to exist must have had a cause, and that because the universe began to exist (according to big bang theory), the universe must have had a cause, and that cause must be infinite and all-powerful and intelligent. There are a couple of problems I have with this argument. The first problem is, why does a "first cause" automatically imply a creator? That is, what logical reasoning is there to draw a line from "there was a first cause" to "the first cause was an intelligent creator"? The second problem is this: If God caused the universe to begin, and God is a part of a causal chain of events, what caused God? You say that God is "uncaused" because he exists atemporally (outside of time) To me, this is borderline begging the question: in order for god to exist, you must make an assumption that he exists atemporally. Is that not the very thing you are trying to demonstrate -- that he exists at all?

Consider this: according to current science, the big bang arose from a singularity -- a state at which the laws of space-time itself break down, where the laws of time do not apply. If you are saying that God's atemporal existence requires no cause, then don't you also have to admit that a singularity (which is also atemporal) does not require a cause? To me, what it all really comes down to is this: with what we currently know from science, any ideas about what happened before the big bang, whether it's colliding membranes in a multiverse, or an intelligent being, is purely speculation -- we just don't know!

At some point you mentioned the multiple universe theory, and that it was untestable. I agree! At this point (while it's a neat idea), I'm not sure it's a viable scientific theory, and therefore it cannot be used as a premise for any "truth-seeking" argument. This causes me to ask you, however: is the idea of God in any way testable? If your standards for truth depend on scientific method, why should God not be held to those same standards? If you believe in God, why not believe in multiple universes?

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Biocentric Universe Theory

Discovery Magazine has published an article on Robert Lanza's "Biocentric Universe" theory, which basically states that life itself is what creates space, time, and the cosmos itself:

This insight snapped into focus one day while [Lanza] was walking through the woods. Looking up, he saw a huge golden orb web spider tethered to the overhead boughs. There the creature sat on a single thread, reaching out across its web to detect the vibrations of a trapped insect struggling to escape. The spider surveyed its universe, but everything beyond that gossamer pinwheel was incomprehensible. The human observer seemed as far-off to the spider as telescopic objects seem to us. Yet there was something kindred: We humans, too, lie at the heart of a great web of space and time whose threads are connected according to laws that dwell in our minds.

Is the web possible without the spider? Are space and time physical objects that would continue to exist even if living creatures were removed from the scene?

This article brings up two arguments to support the theory: Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, and the "Goldilocks principle". Many pseudo-scientists like to use Heisenberg's uncertainty principle to push their pseudo-scientific ideas. In this case, Lanza asserts that the wave function of a particle collapses when observed, thus bringing the particle into existence.

In physics, this is known as the observer effect. The term is often misused to describe Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. The uncertainty principle actually deals with measurement, not observation -- the principle merely describes how precisely we may simultaneously measure position and momentum of a particle.

The "Goldilocks Principle" is also used to push the rare earth hypothesis, which is similar to the cosmilogical constants argument. This basically states that a planet that can harbour life is extremely improbable or rare. The flaw in this argument, I believe, is that it only takes into account life as we know it. That is, it fails to consider life that may form under different circumstances. David Darling, a british astronomer and science writer, argues that the rare earth hypothesis is merely a description of how life arose on Earth. In his view, rare-earth advocates do nothing more than select the factors that best suit their case:

What matters is not whether there's anything unusual about the Earth; there's going to be something idiosyncratic bout every planet in space. What matters is whether any of Earth's circumstances are not only unusual but also essential for complex life. So far we've seen nothing to suggest there is.

While I disagree with Lanza's biocentric universe theory, I still have to give him props for his work in the field of stem cell research. Needless to say, he shouldn't quit his day job.

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